Chapter 55 The Antique Clocks (2/2)

There were a lot of units for auction this time—twenty-five of them!

Hans said that the storage company was about to close down for good. They would locate a bunch of units whose owners had not renewed their leases, then auction all of them off in one go. They would no longer rent out any more units.

Li Du nodded. Luckily, his control of the bug had increased by leaps and bounds. Otherwise, he could never look through all of the storage units here at once.

Actually, he still couldn’t do it all at once.

But since he was looking for something specific—the antique clocks, and he wasn’t scanning through every single thing, it would be somewhat easier.

Out of the twenty-five storage units, ten were mini units and the other fifteen were small units; all of these were rather small. Considering that the antique clocks were large and there were a large number of them together, they weren’t difficult to find.

He flew the bug, weaving throughout the units, searching rapidly, and quickly found the clocks in a small unit.

He was ecstatic. The clocks had all been stored in wooden boxes which had been wrapped with multiple layers of brown packing paper. They were very well kept and difficult to find for treasure hunters.

Li Du counted fifty or sixty boxes, most of which were empty; only nine still contained clocks.

They had probably been made in bulk. They all looked similar to each other—made of namwood, with gilded exteriors, Roman numerals, and dials colored red, green and yellow. They looked magnificent.

Having found the clocks, he took down the unit number, which was 240. It contained all the wooden boxes while at the entrance laid some sacks and raw cowhide. It was quite easy to spot.

Li Du guessed that the boxes here had all contained antique clocks at one point, but most of them had been sold off, leaving the last nine of them.

They would take them just as well. He was, however, unable to tell the age or make of the clocks, and so neither was he able to deduce their value.

Having accomplished his mission of finding the clocks, they went back to the city center to find food and lodging.

Hans seemed to be familiar with the whole of Arizona. He brought Li Du into Jerome and said, ”I’ll bring you to stay in a mansion tonight.”

Li Du was taken aback. ”There’s a mansion in the Jerome State Historic Park? We aren’t going to sleep in the park tonight, are we? Wouldn’t we be homeless then?

Hans puffed his chest out and said, ”Come with me.”

They drove deeper into the park. A huge mansion appeared at the end of the road. On it was a sign that said, ”The House of James Douglas.”

”James Douglas was Jerome’s first mining tycoon,” Hans explained. ”This mansion was built in 1916. It bore witness to Jerome’s prime.

”He never married and had no offspring. Before he died, he donated this mansion to the country as a historic hotel.”

The mansion was enormous, with many rooms. The two of them booked a presidential suite. It only cost 155 dollars a night, and for the three days that they booked it, they could stay an extra day for free!

After putting down their luggage, they went to have dinner. Of course, Hans was the one who arranged everything once again.

Hans asked, ”You aren’t scared of heights, are you?”

Li Du shook his head. ”Of course not, why?”

Hans didn’t reply and the reason revealed itself to him almost right away. They entered a park called ”Audrey Headframe Park.” Within its valley was nestled a large number of restaurants.

The restaurant they went to had been built over the mine, its floors made of tempered glass. When one looked down, they could see a bottomless mining pit!

”This is one of the classiest restaurants in Arizona. How deep do you think the mining pit below us is?” asked Hans.

The walls of the mining pit were illuminated by incandescent lamps, but try as he might, Li Du was unable to see the bottom. He just shook his head. ”I can’t make a guess.”

”It is 1,910 feet, which is 650 feet more than the Empire State Building’s height!” Hans exclaimed.

Li Du exclaimed in wonder, ”Who thought of building a restaurant here in the first place? What a crazy, ingenious idea!”

This was his first time eating at a restaurant like this. Undeniably, it was a little scary, but it was also ingenious.